Ahh this was overall pretty cute even if there were some things that bugged me. To start, I do think the author did a good job of writing a relationship with age difference without making it manipulative/creepy/problematic, and that was honestly my biggest worry going into this! There's a fairly large age difference as well as a power dynamic at play but, like I said, the author does a good job of explaining that/making the relationship still readable. Both characters outright acknowledge both aspects of their relationship, and that made it okay for me.

Unfortunately, in order to so we had to have two POVs, and that kind of killed the slow burn for me.

Spoiler

The duo don't actually truly get together until like, 90% in and then it ends with a miracle happy ending where the consequences go away rather than them being solved.

Normally, I love slow burns, but I just don't think it was well executed here, and I think having POVs of both characters did not help. Most slow burns logically burn slow, but here, it was hard at times to follow the logic of why these two were not kissing. It felt like the author was just throwing in more and more new things to keep them apart and it kinda got frustrating after a while for me

Spoiler

specifically when Evelyn was mistaken as a girlfriend and it caused tension for a few chapters

. This frustration was only heightened by how early each character realized they had feelings for the other but just... didn't do anything about it (largely due to power dynamic and age but still). It just made the relationship feel stagnant for a while. They were both as close as they could get without actually admitting they wanted the other, but then they just... kept not admitting it.

I did really like the f/f rep though (love my bi Emma!), and I also really loved that Jo wasn't the 'experienced' one of the two, and seeing her get just as nervous around Emma was adorable. So overall, this wasn't a bad book at all! It just wasn't a perfect romance for me.